Mirror.co.uk – December 23, 2005

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Going for a song

By n/a
Source: Mirror

The roles could not be more different. Not so long ago she was the revenge-seeking Bride who hacked, sliced and karate-kicked her way through an army of assassins in the gory Kill Bill. Now she is the sweet and sexy, singing and dancing Swedish secretary Ulla in the film version of Mel Brooks’ Broadway musical The Producers.

But Uma Thurman believes that the gruelling six months she spent as a blood-splattered punchbag in Quentin Tarantino’s two-part martial arts thriller may have actually helped her achieve what she calls her “Ginger Rogers dream”.

Although she once said of Kill Bill that, “It wasn’t a job, it was an ordeal”, while describing it as “a sick joke”, Uma, 35, now says it provided her with the training that helped her venture successfully into the world of musical comedy.

“I trained for Kill Bill with the martial arts master Yuen Wo-ping and he turned me into the Bionic Woman,” she recalls ruefully.

“But going through that training made me coordinated. I feel like I got something back from that which helped me today.”

A statuesque blonde with dramatically angled features, Uma is talking at a hotel in New York shortly before the premiere of The Producers. She recently gave up smoking “a lifelong struggle”, but she seems relaxed and cheerful.

Briefly wed in 1990 to the British actor Gary Oldman, her five-year marriage to Ethan Hawke ended two years ago and they have only recently settled the question of custody of their two children, Maya, seven, and Roan three.

“I hope that we can all move forward on a positive level together, because that’s the deal – that’s what you do,” she says.

“The difficulty in getting to that place is upsetting, but you have to try.”

She continues to live most of the time in her Manhattan apartment with the children, but she and the new man in her life, hotelier Andre Balzas, 48, earlier this year bought former Penthouse boss Bob Guccione’s estate in upstate New York and have been moving in. She had known Balzas for several years before they became romantically involved, and she is clearly happy with her life.

“I am with a really wonderful man who’s extremely generous and has really been there, and that’s something very unusual for me,” she says. But she’s not tempted to get married again in a hurry.

“Nobody wants me to get married again,” she laughs. “My friends make me promise I’ll never remarry, but I don’t know. I wish I would do it again because I think there’s something beautiful and optimistic about marriage. I think it’s terribly beautiful, but I’m not remarrying at the moment.”

Maya and Roan go with Uma on location whenever they can and she is already seeing signs that they may have bright futures in showbusiness. “I think they might have a lot of talent if genetics hands you anything, but they are also just very expressive kids,” she says, beaming proudly. “It’s hard to comment on yourself as a parent, but my mother says I’m messing things up because grandparents are supposed to be able to spoil the children and I’ve ruined them.

“I spoil them so badly she has nothing to do. But I can’t help it. I don’t really know what to discipline them about because I find them both so amusing. I’m probably making monsters, but I so desperately want them to be happy.”

Uma has the earthbound confidence of someone who made her first film at 16 and can’t recall a time when she wasn’t famous. “I don’t feel famous,” she insists disarmingly. “Do you know what I mean? Sometimes I am, sometimes I’m not, but it’s hard to feel it. Does that make any sense?”

Named after a Hindu goddess, Uma was born in Boston and raised as the lone girl among three brothers – Ganden, Dechen and Mipam – in a liberal household. Her father Robert is a professor of Indo-Tibetan studies at Columbia University -the Dalai Lama would even occasionally visit them at home – and her mother Nena is a psychotherapist and former model. Uma began her career as a model, too, but moved into acting in 1988 as the young seductress in Kiss Daddy Goodnight and the same year made her mark as the virginal Cecile in Dangerous Liaisons.

Until The Producers, Dangerous Liaisons was the last film premiere Uma attended. “I was 18 at the time and so sensitive,” she recalls. “And because the movie was a tragedy, I sat there and started sobbing so hysterically that they had to remove me from the theatre and put me in a car.”

Refusing to be typecast, Uma continually reinvents herself on screen, usually taking serious actress roles, but occasionally surprising critics and sometimes even herself by opting for over-the-top assignments such as Poison Ivy in Batman And Robin and, of course, Kill Bill’s The Bride. She revealed her depth and acting ability as the controlling wife of Henry Miller in 1990’s Henry And June, but then appeared in a series of below par film – Jennifer Eight, Mad Dog And Glory and Even Cowgirls Get The Blues among them.

Then came 1994′s Pulp Fiction and the role that many cinemagoers will always remember her for when Uma played Mia Wallace, the gangster’s moll who memorably dances with John Travolta, unwittingly takes an overdose and, shockingly, has an adrenalin shot plunged into her chest.

For all her efforts she received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination. Uma took the role in The Producers, in which she co-stars with the original Broadway stars Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick, after Nicole Kidman turned it down.

“It was the most work I’ve ever had to do for a small part,” Uma says. “I had a wonderful time rehearsing and I practiced for seven weeks before production even started. Then I practiced for a long time during production, which went on for three months, but I had more fun than I’ve ever had in my entire life.

“I mean, there are not very many of these movies that get made and although people know I can dance a little, it’s not like I’d be the first person anyone would think of for this role. It’s hard to open those doors, so getting a chance to live this Ginger Rogers dream was so exciting.

“I danced every day and I sang almost every day. The whole Broadway team who trained and worked with me were amazing. They were so disciplined, so hard-working, such perfectionists and so detail oriented.”

The 5ft 11in Thurman added several inches to her height with high-heeled shoes to portray the sweet and sexy Ulla.

“She’s an amazing creature,” she says. “Very liberated and so completely without guile or neuroses. She is sexual, sensual and loving.”

The fact that Uma’s mother is partly Swedish was no help to her in capturing the particular Swedish accent that Mel Brooks wanted for the part.

“He didn’t want a realistic Swedish accent,” she says.

“He wanted it to be a little absurd, but he didn’t really know, so I worked with a dialect coach.”

For someone who has lived her life in the glare of celebrity, Uma Thurman appears remarkably unaffected by stardom. Unlike many of her peers, she does not worry unduly about her next role or her place in celluloid history.

“I used to be more paranoid, stressed and constantly worrying about my Plan B,” she says, only half seriously.

“But the truth is I don’t have a Plan B and worrying about it is going to kill my Plan A, which is living the life I have right now and doing what I love to do while I’m blessed to be able to do it.

“I can’t worry about when somebody is going to tell me I can’t do it anymore and take my Screen Actors’ Guild card away, because if you let yourself admit you’re worried about it, you’re very vulnerable to it.

“I’m not a shrinking, insecure, awkward 18-year-old any more, thank heavens. I think I’ve become comfortable with myself and accepting of my failures, successes, shortcomings and struggles.

“I used to be tremendously hard on myself and never gave myself any credit for anything. It became ridiculous – self-loathing for no reason.

“So now I have decided to take my foot off the gas pedal. I guess it comes with age.”